To Be Real
by ShaNini86
Summary: "After all this time, after all the things they'd witnesses and been through, after all the times they'd both almost disappeared, he still could make her both simultaneously ashamed and grateful for her life and for his presence in it." A very long one-shot post 13.1, "Wheels Up." Rated K for some adult content and themes.


**Hi, all! It's been a really long time since I've written and posted one of these, but I've recently found myself stuck within some of my original writing, and I decided to get the writing kinks out via Fanfiction. This story is a lot more angsty than I tend to write now-a-days, so sound the emo alert! I weave in and out of a lot of different moments without the best transitions, but it's a thing that I wrote and now it's a thing you're, hopefully, going to read and have thoughts about…**

 **That being said, a few points to note before reading: Some facts about Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, traumatic aftermath, and some symptoms of depression are based on Google search results and my personal knowledge of psychology. Also, I openly detail casual sex, as well as alcohol and drug use, so if that's not something you can read without being triggered, I'd suggest ignoring this very long one-shot. Additionally, I have some potty language and the characters speaking and acting in some ways we don't see on the show, so if you're a hardcore fan who doesn't enjoy that type of characterization, I may not be the writer for you.**

 **Lastly, I reference a ton of CM episodes and moments that span the show's entirety, but this one-shot is set after episode 13.1, "Wheels Up", during the six-week period the team was on leave. There's also some references to 13.2, "To A Better Place."**

 **Without further ado, happy reading!**

* * *

" _Give me something to believe in, a breath from the breathing… I don't think I'll close my eyes cause lately I'm not dreaming, so what's the point in sleeping? It's just at night, I've got nowhere to hide."_ –Jack's Mannequin, "Hammers & Strings"

* * *

" _No, no, no, Spence, please. I need someone I know is real right now, alright?"_

Much later on, when Reid was drunk and numb but not numb enough to stop the endless memory loop from replaying the past few months, he realized that Emily had possibly said she needed him because he was real and because for as broken and as bitter as he'd become, she knew he'd stop; she knew that he wouldn't go after Scratch; he wouldn't risk his tenuous reinstatement to the team; she wouldn't lose him again. He'd eyed Simmons, who nodded and left without a word, already fitting on the time in far less time than it had ever taken him. Reid had only half-watched Simmons race off into the dark he'd just materialized from before he'd given Prentiss his full attention.

Many weeks later, he'd ask Prentiss if she feared that he'd lose it on a case, snap like so many others they'd known over the years, and she had squeezed his hand, told him he was sturdy, a testament to the trust they'd built over the years, but that moment and reassurance was too far away. Weeks before then, he could only feel blinding hot rage for Scratch. He could only feel all the moments he'd lost.

* * *

The woman covered in a thin cotton sheet asleep in bed next to him didn't look anything like Emily or JJ or even his mother. Freckled skin blurred in and out of view, washed in the yellow light blinking inside from a streetlight next to her apartment window. Her strawberry blond hair lay in a tangled heap on the pillow behind her. Black mascara was smudged under her eyelids, and her parted lips were caked with dry maroon lipstick. Hours earlier, they'd barely made it up the five winding floors to her apartment. By the time she shoved the door open in a jangle of keys that dropped to the kitchen floor, Reid was tearing at her thin see-through top, their clothes splaying in various directions as the hungrily backed into her bedroom, careless and drunk and both desperate for skin on skin.

It hadn't taken long for them to discard all their clothes as easily as the rain that had pounded down during their swayed walk home from the bar –– the very one Reid had purposefully chosen in a neighborhood far from his apartment because he was almost certain none of his coworkers would come looking for him there.

They'd been on break for close to four weeks, but his teammates called every day, trading turns as if checking in on him was a board game where each BAU member rolled a dice, landing on the appropriate marker, counting the spots from where he was and where he needed to be. Reid had desperately missed them for so long, but, now, their concern coupled with the drain of caring for his mother while he was in a constant state of sleep-deprivation, flashbacks, and hyperviligence, made him feel as though there wasn't enough air.

Carefully, Reid swung his legs over the side of the bar woman's bed, dried sweat pulling taunt, and he planted cold barefoot feet on a shaggy throw rug. While he waited for the drunken dizziness to pass, Reid closed his eyes, inhaling and exhaling slowly through his nostrils, the way JJ had instructed the first time he'd panicked in the grocery store during the first week of break.

About three weeks prior, JJ had whispered this trick to him, guiding him with a gentle hand on the small of his back until they were outside and he'd ducked into an alley leading to the store's loading dock. Next to a large dumpster, he'd vomited the meager breakfast he'd eaten an hour before their shopping excursion. When finished, Reid had turned toward JJ with flushed, wet cheeks, and she hadn't said a word, but had driven him home and taken care of his mother while he had slept for hours.

As he groped for his clothes in the room a little larger than his closet, the memory of the way the girl from the bar had clawed at his back with her stubbed nails, arching her hips in tempo to meet his, her lips painfully pressing into his suddenly imprinted like a ghost on Reid's naked body. If he wanted, he could slide in bed next to her, wake her with a hand lightly running down the slope of her stomach. Reid imagined she'd probably wake, stale alcohol releasing through their pores, but she'd possibly dissolve his body into hers, disappearing into another even if it, like everything Reid tried grasp lately, was temporary and fleeting. The idea of being able to lose himself was tantalizing, inviting to his cold body, to the panic spreading shocks to his limbs, and especially to his racing, still addled-by-drinks brain, but he found he didn't want her because the sex was emotionless, like he'd felt earlier that night when she had pulled him close to her and he could smell the cheap clove cigarette on her breath.

Right before last call, he'd followed her outside the dive bar for a smoke break even though he didn't smoke, but he had enjoyed the monotony of watching her pull a cigarette pack out of her back pocket, the crackle of a lit a match, and the eventual first soothing drag. They hadn't talked much while she'd smoked. She'd eyed him while he avoided her gaze. Is this what Morgan had searched for all those years before Savannah? Reid had ignored his calls as much as he'd ignored the others on the team these past few weeks, and he found myself studying the bar woman when she flicked the finished cigarette to the damp group.

Rain noisily waterfalled off the overhead vinyl awning before crashing to the sidewalk. Through the rain's clatter and the murky outside light, she noticed him noticing her. Hours earlier, she had slid across from him in the corner booth, moving his wall of empty glasses before sliding a new, full beer toward him, her subtle smile easily disarming his glass defenses. Now, with too many drinks muddling his senses, Reid hypnotically watched her hips swing back and forth when sauntered over in the lingering cigarette smoke.

"I think," she began, a finger lightly tracing the stubble on his chin, "you should come home with me."

Reid's jaw clenched. Before he could contemplate her proposal, her hands were running on his chest and then down to his waist. He'd reflexively tensed from the unexpected touch, his hands reaching for her thin wrists, but not just because he didn't like physical contact, but also because they were outside a bar at last call in a shady neighborhood and, reinstated or not, he was still an FBI agent.

"I don't think…" He tried to protest, but she easily twisted her wrists out of his light grasp.

"That's the problem. Just don't think." She countered.

"I'm not good with that…" Reid explained.

When she laughed and leaned close and nibbled his earlobe, she was all cloves and beer, and his legs were suddenly weak from pretending he didn't want the release she was insinuating. God, her hands were everywhere, his skin was on fire, and Reid could barely stand. Electricity jolted under his skin, and Reid automatically responded to her lips on his as his fingertips traveled to lightly graze the soft skin under her thin shirt.

The moment he understood where her hands were traveling, though, Reid tried to protest, "Not here…we're…the bar…"

But his words were drowned in the symphony of noise the rain was creating. She was already reaching over his belt buckle and underneath the top of the loose jeans that sagged at his hips, and Reid remembered how they had once been more form fitting. He'd wanted to tell her to stop, that he was fucking unraveling and that he shouldn't be around her, around anyone, but the hardness now entrapped in her hand felt too good, and he found that he didn't care anymore. His body reacted before his brain and, for once, Reid felt grateful not everything in his life was so logical or convoluted. Back pushed against the wet bricks of the bar sent goosebumps up the flesh of his arms. He groaned hungrily, losing his hands in her thick curls, the subtle outline of her collarbones, and the flowery scent on her neck before she released him from her grip, pulling him with a shriek into the rain and toward her apartment.

Hours later in her disheveled apartment, Reid located his discard clothes in the dim light, and he set to work clumsily, yet silently, dressing himself in his still damp jeans, a faded black undershirt, and a dark green flannel shirt that was not at all his style, but Reid hadn't worried about impressing anyone, never mind potential hookups, when he'd left his empty apartment earlier that night.

At the time, he'd wanted to just drown out the thoughts and the memories that assaulted him in both his dreams and waking hours, both of which were magnified by the constant buzz of his phone. Luke, Tara, JJ, Prentiss, and even Rossi had all checked in on him both through phone lines, as well as planned and surprise visits, and Reid found he just wanted peace. He wanted to be alone because ever since reintegrating into normal society, he'd become, if possible, more of an introvert, seeking quiet in libraries, darkened movie theaters, even long walks through empty streets and half-filled bars in seedy parts of towns. Reflexively, he'd said goodbye to his mother even though the woman no longer was there. He'd crossed the threshold into the hallway and shut the door when he realized she wasn't present, and she wouldn't be when he returned.

* * *

He'd researched care facilities the fourth full night he'd been home after the Scratch takedown. In his dreams, he recalled the gray matter splattered against a sidewalk. Reid had only half-believed Alvez when the agent had said Lewis fallen while in the midst of a chase. If Reid knew Scratch, he knew that he had gone out with one last torment, and Alzev had been his last victim, possibly extending a hand to help before Lewis had grinned and let go, sailing to the hard earth below them all.

Outside the warehouse, Reid had read between the lines etched on Alvez's far-off expression, had almost pulled him aside to confirm his thoughts, but Emily's trembling frame still leaning against his and the memories of the dried blood on JJ's face, or Rossi's labored breathing while the older agent had both berated and instructed him and Alvez in his hospital room while refusing care, had made him momentarily pause and stare at the body of Peter Lewis. Committing the image to memory hadn't been hard, and Reid had been desperate to tell his unconscious mind that Scratch was dead, that he, that they all, could move on, but he knew what was coming, had dreaded it and understood that he would be changed, and that none of them would be returning to who they once were. He understood, but he hadn't. How could he possibly really understand the imprints etched onto his life that had been thrown so mercilessly upside-down the past few months?

His mother's ups and downs had assaulted him those first few days after Stephen's funeral. Although he had told the team "wheels up," Reid had been scared to admit he didn't know what would happen if he didn't return to the BAU. His mother, however, didn't have the mental capacity to listen to his worries, and his days were filled with her care. When he did return with the rest of the BAU from their mandated exiles, Reid wasn't sure how he would cope with the job and the insurmountable task of watching his brilliant mother further deteriorate.

After one memorable night, when Diana had switched from detached to livid, throwing a dinner plate that had smashed against the wall behind him, a jagged piece slicing a cut onto the back of his neck, Reid realized he couldn't do it, even though he'd promised her he'd never leave her again. He fully despised himself in that moment, his own self-hatred quickly leading to helplessness as he'd called Tara and JJ and Garcia, voice wobbling when he admitted he needed them to make things right.

Without hesitation, all three had raced over, compassionately cleaning the destroyed kitchen and calming and caring for his mother while he locked himself in the bathroom, fist shoved into his mouth, teeth indenting knuckles as sobs tore through his body. He didn't know how long he was crouched on the bath mat next to the tub until JJ materialized at his side, placed a soothing hand on his back, and pulled him close while she explained it was okay that he wasn't okay. He had let her clean and dress the cut on his neck, lead him to his bed, and then soothe him into a deep sleep that left him feeling both disoriented and ashamed the next morning.

Unfortunately, they'd all appeared the next day to check in and to talk about his options. When he'd mumbled that, perhaps, this situation, especially paired with his current mental state, was too much to handle, Tara had eloquently appealed to his logic, which he'd been silently grateful for because her words had made more sense than anything else had the past few months. Garcia had been, well, Garcia, eyes welling as she reached for his hand and squeezed so tightly he'd momentarily lost circulation. In that moment of desperation, Reid had begged all three not to call Emily. She was the team head now, replacing Hotch who had so often become the father figure Reid had needed during trying times throughout the years, and Reid wasn't sure how to navigate this change in leadership or the space he had purposefully imposed between himself and Prentiss. A few days prior, she'd begged him to be real, and he had been, solidly protecting her because he understood how confusing it was when the mind played tricks, dizzying perception into a haze somewhere between dream and reality. Because he'd looked anywhere but the other three women, Reid missed the conversation they had all had exchanged through worried glances.

Hand still in Garcia's, Reid had told the floor that he thought his mother had needed more care than he could provide. After a long moment of silence, JJ had reacted differently than he'd expected, and her steely stare had bent to his level and thrown off his defenses. He'd broken eye contact with her almost immediately, cheeks blazing, and only then had Garcia released her death grip to throw a deep look at the blond agent.

"Are you sure, Spence?" JJ had asked quietly, but with no less intensity, after a pregnant pause, again catching his fallen gaze with a tilt of her head.

Reid had parted his lips, trying to find the words to tell JJ he could barely function, hadn't eaten anything more than black coffee and a few pieces of toast, and that he was spending most nights watching his mother's restless sleep while repeatedly replaying his jail time, dozing off each morning when the first of the sun's rays began to kiss the room in a yellow glow. He wanted to tell JJ how exhausted he was; how he jumped each time his mother said his name because it was so rare she remember anything anymore; how the murder in the motel had barged into his consciousness –– foggy and fragmented –– during innocuous moments: when he was preparing coffee, nutritionally balanced meals for his mother but nothing for himself, or even when he was staring at the washer as it completed a spin cycle. Instead, he nodded yes and broke contact with her eyes the same color blue as the sky the day after he'd been released from prison. He remembered how the hue had been so blinding that he'd become momentarily overcome with gratitude for the outside world. For a brief moment, under a brilliant sky as a free man, Reid had understood religion.

"I can't do it anymore."

What Reid realized two weeks after that confession and after leaving his mother in a home that was considered top notch and had passed all four of their vigorous inspections, was he should of told Tara and Garcia and JJ that it wasn't that he _couldn't_ care for his mother or love her or leave her even when he stupidly promised her he'd never do it again, but, rather, it was that he _couldn't_ take care of her and himself and if it he was going to cause a demise, it might as well be his and not hers. She'd been through too much lately, but had the luxury of forgetting most of it, disappearing behind the gray cloud in her eyes, barely recognizing him as she absentmindedly asked the nurse if her new room overlooked the garden, like Bennington's had.

After a full morning of paperwork and moving his mother's things into her new room, the moment to leave had finally arrived. He'd knelt to her side, gently taking her soft and wrinkled hands in his, promising to visit each day before saying a whispered goodbye. Dianna had looked at him, puzzled by the tenderness and words, but had nodded in the affirmative. He'd heard her whispered "Who's he?" to the nurse as soon as he'd turned on his heels to exit. Although he'd expected her confusion, had heard it so many times before, his breath hitched in his throat, the air felt momentarily heavy, and he'd avoided the sympathetic gazes of all three teammates.

If Tara, JJ, and Garcia had heard her too, none of them breathed a word of it, not through the plush foyer, the walkway with its fountain glistening in the sun, or in the cool flow of the car's air conditioner. In the backseat, Reid pressed his face against the window, watching the outside streets and stores blur into indistinguishable forms.

Tara reached for his hand, placing her palm on top of his trembling fingers, and he hadn't pulled away despite that he and Tara had far less history than JJ and Garcia who occupied the front seats. The notion of comfort grounded him, even during the short drive when his oscillating emotions threatened to tell JJ to pull over on a side street so he could burst out of the car and disappear down an alley, searching for the one substance that would really make him forget everything. When they finally arrived at his building, Garcia had turned around in the passenger seat, and he'd met her concerned eyes with a hard stare. Insides churning, rage spoke for him before he could stop himself.

"Just don't, Garcia. Not now. Please."

Surprised, she'd gulped past her hurt, her facial expression told him that much, but Reid still felt enraged when he'd shaken off all of their concerned looks the minute they pulled into his building's parking lot.

"I'm really tired. Thank you."

He'd pulled from Tara's gentle squeeze as he'd quickly exited so neither of the three could corner him, follow him inside, see how the anger erupted once he closed and locked and dead-bolted the door.

Alone, he began hurling everything that was in relative reach: Books with pages that flapped in the air like fruitlessly beating wings; coffee-stained mugs that shattered gloriously; a pair of his shoes that left dark scuff marks against unblemished white walls. He'd screamed while he threw his life into pieces, hoping everything would break, hoping he would. Reid wasn't sure how long he created chaos, but, hours later, he'd woken on the area rug next to his coffee table with a discarded cardigan that he must have been using as a pillow stuck to his face.

While pulling his aching body off the floor and surveying the mess in the dim early evening light, Reid realized he needed to get out, so he hadn't thought twice before grabbing his wallet and cell phone and headed out of the door. Anywhere he could be anonymous would be preferable to a place where his coworkers, all of whom had spare keys, would find him asleep on the floor, stuff scattered as though a tornado had come through and uprooted everything, destroying any semblance of who he'd been and who he may be becoming.

* * *

Throughout his years in the BAU, Reid had learned how to walk on his toes, anticipating the creek of a floorboard from even the smallest application of weight, but his time in prison had taught him to become invisible, disappearing into the air that always smelled musty, as if it too had been caged in for so long that the fresh outside air had become a thing of daydreams.

But Reid was still drunk, and navigating in semi-darkness was harder than he imagined. In bar lady's kitchen, Reid gave in to the screams of his sandpaper-dry throat, and he yanked the fridge door open with too much force; his back hit the sharp edge of the island counter.

"Fuck!" he spat.

For a moment, he heard her shuffle between sheets in the adjacent bedroom. The last thing he wanted was to encounter the woman, whose name he couldn't recall, that he'd met at the bar hours earlier. She'd seen him hunched over a few empty glasses in the corner table. Maybe she felt bad for him, Reid figured. Maybe he looked as destitute as he felt, or maybe she just wanted to feel real too, wanted to forget some bad memory that kept her jolting awake each night in tangled, sopping sheets. Maybe, Reid figured, she knew that losing herself with someone else for just one night was better than losing yourself while alone with the very worst of your thoughts. In her dingy kitchen that smelled like rotting fruit, Reid made a mental note to tell Morgan he finally understand the appeal of one-night stands the next time the old agent checked in with him.

Reid froze, his lower back pulsating from contact with the island's sharp edge, but when she didn't materialize from the bedroom, he turned his attention to her bare fridge. Behind an expired container of milk and a lone apple, Reid found two cold beers. Pocketing one while holding the other in his hand, he made his way through the rest of the small apartment cluttered with mail tossed onto sticky counters, dishes covered with dried food remnants, and a cat box with many mini mountains. By the front door, Reid peered through a beaded door that separated the small foyer from a sitting room with a couch that looked patched and torn from years of use. A large fluffy cat sprawled on a refurbished armchair. The animal lifted its head as Reid opened the front door. Yellow eyes met his through the darkness and, for a moment, Reid almost felt guilty.

"It was just meaningless sex," he told the cat before closing the door with a soft click.

* * *

On the deserted sidewalk, Reid sighed, closing his eyes as the night air stung his skin. After a few deep inhalations and exhalations, he reemerged and smiled. The aluminum can was cold in his hand before it popped open with a fizz. Reid easily downed the beer in a few gulps. Stumbling past a garbage can that was on the curb's edge for the trucks that would rumble down the street in a few hours, Reid tossed the empty inside, swaying next to the putrid smell while he quickly downed the next can he'd taken from mystery woman's apartment. He didn't bother to return the lid onto the garbage can before he tripped his way up the cracked sidewalk. This wasn't the best part of town, especially for a late night drunken stroll, but Reid didn't care.

The freedom was as intoxicating as all the alcohol he'd consumed that night (he'd lost count around drink six), and the late-night, early-morning dew clung to his body, soaking through the cloth portion of his converse shoes. While locked up, he'd missed the smallest parts of the outside world: coffee curling upward from a steaming mug each morning; the cool air at dawn as he walked to the bus stop; the way JJ laughed and snorted slightly through her nose when she was most amused; how the vibration of the subway felt like a slight rumble under his feet when he walked around DC with Garcia while they shopped for a birthday gift for Emily, finally finding the perfect book of poetry in an antique shop; the streak of vibrant colors as he watched the sun's rise and fall through an opaque window on the jet on the way to and from cases. At one point, he'd been so afraid he'd never see anyone or anything ever again that Reid had stopped trying to imagine the outside. To forget the world was easy when he was trying to survive, but existing on the outside was also proving difficult.

 _Emily,_ Reid thought. _Emily will understand._

Years prior, Emily had disappeared into deception, emerging within a whirlwind of confusion and hurt. It had taken him many months to forgive her even though the longing had been there the minute her dark eyes met his across the round table. He'd remained obstinate, though, clinging to months of grief despite being so grateful she had returned to him, to the team, and to the world where her laughter warmed the dread growing in his stomach and her soft, cautious, glances across a crowded plane made him feel a rush of affection for her life that was interwoven with his. Emily was one of the few people who knew how to ground him during trying times when he was unable to step away to collect his racing thoughts, or how he once took his coffee so sweet that he'd flirted with cavities each sip, or how she, over the years, had called him on nights she knew neither could sleep and they'd met at late night diners, devouring plates of pie while sitting in comfortable silence.

 _She needed someone real,_ he reminded himself even though he felt far from real anymore. If anything, he felt detached and ephemeral, floating somewhere between the events of the last few months. When the tears began sliding down his frozen cheeks, Reid didn't know why he laughed aloud.

* * *

Admittedly, Emily wasn't sleeping when the syncopated, loud knocks echoed through her apartment. Technically, she was in bed, yet had been staring at the ceiling for hours. Cold sweat had long since dried at her hairline, a residue from the nightmare that had actually woken her hours earlier. In it, she'd been the one to find Scratch, and the illusion had been so convincing that she'd shot them all: JJ, Garcia, Alvez, Rossi, and Reid before she'd realized it was a trick –– it was his ultimate trick. Screaming, Emily had bolted upright, groaning in frustration as she ineffectively punched her memory foam mattress. Peter Lewis was dead, but in Emily's dreams, he never ceased to live.

"What the hell…" Emily muttered as the banging become loud and more desperate.

As she walked through her apartment, Emily pulled an old sweatshirt on over her thin tank top and flannel pajama pants. The nights were cooling, fall on the heels of a reluctant to leave summer, and Emily almost welcomed the rush of early morning against her cheeks until the unmistakable scent of alcohol accosted her nostrils.

"Reid?" She asked, disbelief edging the question louder than Emily would have liked.

The youngest member of the team swayed on her doorstep. One of his shoes was untied and both shoes were sodden with dew. Assessing Reid's thin frame, Emily noticed only two of his flannel shirt buttons were actually buttoned, some were missing, and his undershirt was inside out. Although the lighting wasn't the best, Emily could easily see the dark bruises under Reid's eyelids, the unkempt hair, the stubble raised on his jawline. For a moment in the low light, Emily thought she saw what look liked a hickey on his neck, but she let the inspection drop the moment Reid leaned forward, nearly falling onto her. Thankfully, he weighed nothing. _Less than he should_ , Emily had thought the instant she'd placed two sturdy hands on Reid's shoulders and she practically carried him over the threshold and inside her home.

"Hey, Emily," he'd hiccupped, and Prentiss smelled the cheap beer that lingered in the air between them.

"God, Reid, what the hell did you drink?

"Not enough," he muttered to himself more than to her.

Turning into the living room, Spencer almost knocked over a tall potted plant. It wobbled unsteadily before falling still.

"Steady, Reid, easy…" she warned. He hiccupped again.

Leading the younger agent to the couch had required some skill, but they both made it unscathed a few minutes later. Reid plopped into the cushions, immediately pulling his now shoeless feet (he'd kicked off one shoe somewhere in the hallway and had struggled with the other one before it flew off his foot and bounced off her coffee table moments earlier) onto the couch cushion while protectively bringing his knees to his chest. From this angle, Emily could see his shaking body, greasy and tangled curls, and the glisten of skin beaded with sweat even though the temperature he'd emerged from wasn't warm.

"Spencer," she said his name quietly, cautiously, as she sunk to the cushion next to him. Reid flinched when he felt her weight.

"You lied to me." He growled.

Surprised for the second time that night, Emily blinked, steadying her gaze but not the rush of emotions that followed.

"You're drunk." She countered.

She hadn't meant for the statement to sound like an accusation, but it had, and she instantly regretted her words. Reid's long legs hit the floor when he jerked upward, hands flying to his long-sleeved flannel. Before Emily realized what was happening, the two remaining buttons were ricocheting off the coffee table with neat pings before disappearing somewhere on the throw rug. Reid struggled to cast off the thin layer, his joints cracking painfully when he finally managed to do so. Bewildered, Emily watched, unsure of what was happening.

"Here!"

Reid thrust his arm, which was now free of his flannel shirt, at her. The elbow hyperextended when the unblemished milky white of his forearm thrust into her direct line of vision.

"I didn't do anything _else_ , Emily. If that's what you're insinuating."

Emily bit her lip. She hadn't been alluding to _that_ at all, but she had thought about it, especially when Reid had materialized on her doorstep, teetering so wildly as though the slightest gust of wind would send him crashing to the hard concrete steps under his feet.

Truthfully, in the past three weeks, she'd feared _that_ return so much that she'd taken to stalking NA meetings, stealing into a cold chair in the very back of meeting rooms while wearing outfits Reid was sure not to notice. A baseball hat with her hair messily shoved underneath was paired with baggy jeans that went out of style in the late 90s and topped with a large sweatshirt that left her void of any shape. The clothing was meant to make her disappear, swallowing her profile so no one would recognize her, and she exhaled in relief each time she'd seen Spencer slink into meetings, always late and avoiding anyone's gaze as he grabbed a chair as far away from others as possible.

Through furtive glances, Emily tried to assess his well-being: Was he eating? Sleeping? Functioning? Although the thin, stretched skin told her he was malnourished and the jumbled curls, wrinkled clothes, and dark circles under his dull eyes told her he certainly was not sleeping, or coping in the slightest, Emily had thought that these moments in damp basements or stuffy meeting halls had shown her that he was okay or, at least, alive each day. Never mind, he ignored most of her calls or visits to his apartment until she reluctantly let herself in with her spare key to find his home uncharacteristically disorganized, his irritated look easily revealing the pity that she desperately tried to cover so he wouldn't see how she'd felt. Never mind that Tara and JJ and Garcia had said that they'd all helped him find a care home for his mother, and that he'd begged all three not to tell her, which hurt Emily more than she'd admit. Never mind that both Alvez and Rossi had preferred to watch from afar, protecting him with bills slipped to bartenders who'd then begin serve an unknowing drunk Reid mocktails and non-alcoholic beers. Both men had told her they'd often (although not tonight, obviously) followed him to rowdy bars in sketchy neighborhoods, watching him exit hours later with the same balance he'd displayed on her doorstep only a few minutes ago. Never mind that he was with her now, that he had come to her and reached out, all his rage and unhappiness threatening to spill into the open.

Despite knowing Reid hated physical touch, Emily placed her cool hand on his surprisingly warm skin, pushing the arm down to his side without resistance. She met his eyes before she spoke in a low, calm tone, "You wanted to, though, Reid."

He nodded his head, breaking eye contact with an angry huff. In an old armchair across the room, Sergio was stretched out and asleep, oblivious to them.

"I don't blame you after these past few months…"

Reid growled, resting two bony elbows on his knees and leaning forward to place his head onto shaking palms.

"I'm sorry." He mumbled.

However muffled, Emily sense that his anger had dissipated the moment it had been expressed. She nodded, daring again to place her hand on Reid's forearm.

"Look at me, Reid."

The order was clipped, but concerned, and Reid immediately turned his attention to Emily. Her voice, he thought with a slight pang of sadness, reminded him of Hotch.

"You have _nothing_ to be ashamed of. You did what you had to do," she ducked her head to meet his falling gaze once more, "then and today."

 _So she knows_ , Reid realized. _Tara or_ _JJ or Garcia must have told her._ He nodded, shrinking away from her grasp and sinking back into the couch. His body was aching, muscles throbbing and heavy.

"I'm struggling, Emily. Worse than before. Worse than all the other times."

In the silence that followed, Emily knew how dangerous this confession was, but she also knew how honest it was. Reid certainly looked worse than all the other lows she'd witnessed the past decade they'd been coworkers and friends. For a fleeting moment, she wondered if this is what her "death" had done to him before she pushed the thought, and the accompanying surge of guilt, back into its proper internal box.

"I know, Reid, and I'm so sorry." Prentiss resisted reaching for him when she saw his lower lip begin to tremble.

"I feel like I'm unraveling, like I'm out of control and everything is coming apart."

She nodded, agreeing with him even though Reid was staring at the ceiling and couldn't see the gesture. In a second, she decided to share a truth she had never dared speak aloud to any of them, minus Hotch, but especially Reid.

"When I came back to the team after Doyle, I felt so relieved to be back with the team and in my old life that I ignored that unraveling feeling until I started having panic attacks."

Eyebrows raised in surprised, Reid turned his head to meet her mocha brown eyes.

"The first one happened in the BAU," Emily admitted, attempting to push the embarrassment down so Reid wouldn't see it now. She needed to be strong for him. "I hid in the bathroom until I felt like I could go back to work."

Spencer hadn't known about her anxiety and, with a slight pang of remorse, he realized that, back then, he'd been too preoccupied with his own feelings over her deception that he hadn't taken the time to really notice how well, or not, she was coping. Now, he knew Emily was coming clean, so to speak, to help him through the shitstorm he'd lived through these past couple months. Suddenly, Reid couldn't stand the waves of shame churning his insides.

He stared at the ceiling before he spoke again. "I didn't know that, Emily. I'm sorry."

Emily sighed, "That's not why I'm telling you that now, Reid. This isn't a game where we play whose past traumas are worse, you know."

Her tone, which should have been edged with sarcasm, just sounded sad. He parsed his lips, closed his eyes, and felt the alcohol waver his fragile sense of equilibrium.

"I got really drunk tonight."

An amused snort, "No shit."

He half-smiled for a moment, hand traveling to the bruise he was sure existed on his neck. The motion didn't go unnoticed by Emily. She caught Reid's eyes when he lifted his head off the back of the couch.

"So which vacuum gave you this?" She joked.

Reid chuckled, and the lightness surprised Emily so much that tears burned her lenses. It had been so long since she'd heard him even remotely laugh that she'd forgotten how innocent the sound was.

"Some woman from the bar," Reid shrugged. "I don't remember her name. Amanda, Melissa, something generic..."

The lack of memory and the flippant wording didn't go unnoticed by either of them, and Emily, once again, stopped herself from reaching for him. Since when did Reid go searching for physical alleviation? That was Morgan's old coping mechanism, but not Reid's. Never his.

"That doesn't sound like you, Spencer."

The very distance past swiftly surfaced in Reid's memory, and he let his own words from another lifetime silently emerge: _Oh, in the months that you've known me you've never seen me act like this? No offense, Emily, but you don't know what you're talking about do ya?_

Instead of reminding Emily of how he'd once, many eons ago, tried to push her away when she threatened to reveal his then drug use, Reid spoke with fresh hurt.

He huffed, "Really, Emily? Don't you think I know that already?"

Emily sighed. She deserved the response and the angry tone it was delivered in, but she was so worried she could taste the familiar bile at the back of her throat. She'd once escaped to France with an ulcer that lined metallic traces on the back of her tongue each day, and the memory had not faded in the intervening years.

"It was just meaningless sex." Reid shrugged again.

Most males that Emily knew, especially the alpha ones at the FBI, would have grinned at the confession, their egos inflated by the encounter and the bragging that followed, but not Reid. He didn't seem ashamed or proud, but, rather, removed. Emily bit her lip to keep her anxiety under control, her tone even, the fear cataloged somewhere inside. Lifetimes before this moment, Emily had told JJ and Hotch she compartmentalized better than most while they stood surrounded by bathroom tiles in a stifling Georgia farmhouse, but, lately, she wasn't fairing so well at controlling and hiding her emotions.

"Reid, sex isn't meaningless."

An eye roll, almost like a moody teenager, "It was _just_ sex, Emily. Sex _can_ be meaningless. It's a basic need. You know, some psychologists argue Maslow should have included it at the very bottom of his hierarchy with the other physiological needs. Really, sex doesn't always have to be about love and intimate connection. Sex, at best, is primal."

Sometimes, when he was most vulnerable, Reid sounded robotic, surrounding everyone with statistics and statements that could not hurt him, could not lash out or leave or break all the pieces he desperately tried to collect and form into a whole each time he lost a part of himself, each time they all did. Emily hated Reid for the facts he threw at everyone during times when they were most heightened, desperate for something tangible to cling on to, yet she loved him for it. The subtle retreat in theories and data was Reid's version of a warning flare, and Emily knew the signal. After Georgia, Emily had discovered that Reid didn't realize that he, during the worst times, dove into statistics instead of reaching out. Reid used his intellect as a buffer, but it was the use of that intellect that told Emily when he needed help the most.

"Since when does anything physical, never mind sex, make you feel better, Reid?"

Although his body visibly tensed and he threw his eyes away from hers and toward the adjacent kitchen, Emily realized she'd hit on a painful truth. Keeping her voice hard and flat, Prentiss continued, "What was it then, Reid? Was drowning yourself easier than facing yourself? Was getting shitfaced and fucking a stranger better than coping? You and I know damn well know I _wouldn't_ , that I _can't_ , reinstate you right now. Not with you like _this._ "

Emily hadn't realized how furious she sounded, or how this feeling bubbled and burst inside her until she spoke, heat rising off her skin and darkening her cheeks. Reid balled the loose fabric resting over his knees. In his fists, his jean crinkled, and Emily saw his knuckles transition from pink to white.

"What if I'm unsure I want to be being reinstated, Emily?" Reid glare was fierce, and Emily couldn't look away. This was a game, one they were both losing, and she couldn't break first.

"Reid—"

"What if I can't do it anymore, Emily?" He interrupted, red rising to his own cheeks now. "What if this time, my mother, Mexico, jail…what if that was just the end of it for good? In case you haven't noticed, it's been a really difficult few years."

And those years, all the ones Emily had lived through and alongside, resurfaced from the past: Hankel, Dilaudid, Gideon's departure, Foyet and Haley's death, Anthrax infestations, Garcia's gunshot, JJ and Morgan's abductions, her own "death" and return, Hotch in witness protection, and all the other past horrors that were slipping by and away before Emily could fully recall them all. Suddenly, the anger bubbles popped, and guilt washed over her.

"What I said just now, Reid, about sex and you not coping was wrong. It was hurtful and wrong and I'm sorry."

Reid nodded, staring pensively at the wall across from them. She saw his eyes linger on a framed portrait of the team.

"It's not entirely wrong, you know. I don't sleep with strangers," he faced her with a wobbling half-smile, and Emily felt herself break. Her eyes filled, and she looked at her clasped hands in her lap to regain her composure.

"I've done it before too," she admitted. He nodded, like he understood, which Emily knew he did.

"After Doyle?" The statement was phrased like a question, and she nodded yes.

A pause and then Reid revealed a part of himself that Emily had never seen before, not even during all those years they'd stood side-by-side, searching desperately through case files and never-ending paperwork piles, stretched across ass-numbing plane seats or fidgeting in hard hospital chairs, even in warehouses and basements, always in darkness, guns drawn and steady as they tiptoed closer and closer to evil.

"I don't know if this is a thing that happens, maybe because it's not something that usually happens to me," Reid began, "I intended to, I wanted to, destroy myself. All I wanted to do was disappear. Does that even make sense?"

His look was one from the past, all innocence and shame and longing for answers that even his brilliant mind couldn't find, and Emily didn't know how to explain. She definitely knew what Reid was referencing: how easy it was to lose yourself in a clash of limbs, the desperate pull on skin that left bruises for days, the unfamiliar smell of someone else lingering on your body.

Emily toyed with the right words before finally speaking after a long moment of silence, "I think you wanting to disappear explains why you went home with her."

Reid nodded, fingertips tapping lightly against his knees. The motion, one Reid did when he was most agitated or conflicted, didn't surprise Emily, and she watched the miniscule movements thump out a rhythm to whatever was being processed in Reid's mind.

Finally, Spencer shook his head, staring at the floor when he spoke. "It was more than that, though, Emily. It was something I don't want to name."

"What do you mean, Reid?" Emily's stomach turned in anticipation.

"There was a point tonight when I was with this woman I didn't know and we were in her bed and, suddenly, I felt like I was floating away from all of it, like I could watch the whole thing, watch myself, watch us, from above, like I wasn't really there. But I didn't feel scared or even concerned, Emily. I felt…I don't know, different…removed, I guess."

For a moment, Emily thought back to her first few weeks in France, about the surges of soreness from the scar tissue on her stomach, the acrid tinge in the back of her mouth, the restless sleep that often drove her to walk on uneven cobblestones and winding Paris streets. Eventually, one night, nightmares made her feel oppressively trapped in her small apartment, and the unsettled memories had led Emily to a dimly lit bar with its promise, like her fake covers, of anonymity.

She'd pretended not to know how to speak more than basic French, hiding behind the guise of tourist looking to have a fling, and the man she'd followed to a small apartment a few blocks away had not been her type. He'd been too tall, too lanky, his fingers stained with nicotine and hardened with callouses created by thick guitar strings. She'd been quiet with him while they'd cast aside clothes and inhibitions, hungrily attempting to focus on the sensations of their hands and grasps and aches, but he'd mumbled incomprehensible French words, and Emily had caught bursts of filthy phrases and terms that had told her this person was a mistake and, ultimately, as she slinked out of his apartment at morning's first light, her coping was too.

In her apartment, sitting next to a fidgeting Reid, Emily realized she knew the feeling and the experience of floating away from yourself. Glancing at Reid, she was surprised when the younger man met her eyes, his look desperate and searching hers for answers. She sighed audibly, breaking contact because she knew what she'd reveal and she hated herself for it.

"You felt numb, Reid. When you were with this woman, your mind wanted to protect you from your emotions because you couldn't handle them at the time, so it removed you from everything, as if everything was a movie and you were the only one in the audience."

Reid nodded mechanically, swallowing past the lump in his throat. "That's exactly how it felt too…"

Unable to stop her next statement, Emily barreled forward, "You disassociated."

In the silence that followed, Reid contemplated Emily's words. Cold truth spread through his limbs, weighting his arms and legs. Suddenly, he felt sick, his stomach twisting and knotting.

"Depersonalization."

Emily winced at the clinical terminology that both she and Reid knew was an experience that often followed traumatic events and also was often was a major sign of depression.

"Do you think you expected to disassociate?" Emily's voice was soft and clear, void of any accusation or judgment.

Reid nodded no, so Emily pressed on. "What was the allure then, Reid? Why the meaningless hookup? That's not you."

Reid shrugged, "It felt easier to do something so uncharacteristic than to talk to you or anyone else. I wanted to connect with someone I didn't have a history with, that I didn't have to explain everything or anything to, but I didn't know, I _don't_ know, how..."

"You know how to ask for help, Reid. After all these years, you do. You're talking now."

Reid sighed, snaking a hand through his hair. Emily studied the sharp angle of his jawline, the translucent skin, the roping blue paths of the veins under his skin. His chin quivered, and for a brief moment, Emily watched Reid struggle for composure.

"I don't know where to start," he stared at the ceiling, head resting on the back of the couch, tears leaking out the corner of his eyes.

"I'm worried about you, Reid. We all are. Just start anywhere."

She tried reaching for him again, but he shrunk away, once more preferring the ceiling view to her prying gaze.

"You lied to me, you know." He repeated, turning his head to the right to assess her expression. This time, Prentiss was the one who broke eye contact.

"That night we were after Scratch. You lied to me then, Emily. You didn't want me to go after him. You lied so I wouldn't go and kill him and destroy my career."

Reid was only half-right, but Emily heard the words he had stated as bluntly as any truth, yet she realized the statistical whirlwinds had left many months prior about the same time she'd raced to Reid's aid while he came down from a high she hadn't seen affect him in close to a decade as they both sat in an interrogation room in a Mexican jail.

"You're right," her voice cracked and she swallowed pass the dryness lining her throat. Reid's eyes met hers, but they were vacant of the anger that so quickly rose to the forefront these days. "I did lie to you then and I'd do it again and again if that kept you from ruining your life."

Reid snorted, anger igniting like a match when lit. "Fucking wonderful, Emily. Thanks for the help." Half-heartedly, he tried to push off the couch, but he was still too drunk, and he flopped helplessly back onto the cushions.

"Reid," Emily reasoned, "you aren't reinstated yet. You were, you _are_ , suffering the impact of false imprisonment and being reintroduced to the real world."

"You should have let me get closure, Emily!" He argued.

She exhaled, frustrated, "What did you expect me to do, Spencer? I _needed_ you to stay with me. God, half the team was still in the hospital and the other half was in witness projection or dead."

At the last admission, Emily's voice cracked, and she looked at Reid's mismatched socks and the frayed end where his left toe threatened to break through the thin cotton. This time, Reid's long fingertips coiled around hers and squeezed reassuringly before breaking contact. In an instance, Emily knew she hadn't quite lost Reid just yet.

"I was so afraid you'd go after Scratch and that would be the last time I saw you again…"

Emily couldn't stop the small sob that escaped her lips. She remembered the plunge in her stomach when Reid had materialized from the darkness, gun drawn and steady. She and Simmons had been crouched behind boxes, plotting just, how, to apprehend Scratch, escape alive, and not lose Alvez too, when Reid had rounded the corner.

She knew he'd be there before she'd even heard him desperately yell her last name from somewhere inside the labyrinth, but she hated him for it. She knew what he wanted because she'd wanted the same thing for Doyle many years prior, but she also knew what would happen if she'd let him go, if she didn't stop him from chasing after Peter Lewis. He'd go back to prison, and she'd lose him for good that time, so she'd pulled rank as a last defense.

 _Lower your weapon, damnit!_

But Reid had been adamant that he was going to go after Scratch, and she'd broken in that moment, broken more than she knew until much later that night.

After the hospital and the quiet ride home where Alvez had thrown cautious, quick, concerned looks, but not words, across the console of his car, she hadn't refused when he offered to sleep on the couch even though she knew he needed proper rest too. Wordlessly, she'd taken the sleeping pill prescribed hours earlier from the ER doctor and the tepid glass of water Alvez had handed her. Before the medication fuzzily lined the edges of her vision, she'd watched Alvez ready the couch with blankets and pillows.

At some point, Luke had felt her gaze and stopped, turning to study her tired eyes and sagging muscles. She saw him take in her dust-covered work clothes, the black pants with a now-ripped knee, eyes traveling to the sweat-stained collar on her wrinkled shirt. She was shivering, although she wasn't cold, but she couldn't stop staring at him even though she knew she was not imagining things or people this time.

When Alvez spoke, his voice was low. "Are you okay?"

Emily recalled how she nodded no, defenses dropped and forgotten, before she'd pleadingly whispered, "It's over, right? Just tell me that it's finally over."

The other agent had, without hesitation, padded across the throw rug to her. He caught her gaze, holding her wavering focus with his steady one.

"It's over, Emily. Scratch is dead. He can't hurt you, or us, anymore."

And when she'd stared past him before she crumbled into his arms, crying so forcefully that she'd soaked his shirt straight through, she had realized how truthful her words to Reid had been that night.

" _No, no, no, Spence, please. I need someone I know is real right now, alright?"_

Earlier that same night she'd sobbed in Alvez's arms, she'd been terrified, trembling next to Simmons, so she'd spoken truthfully to Reid. Emily's voice had cracked because she was also afraid this was all just part of Scratch's plan and that neither Simmons and Reid and Alvez, whereabouts unknown, were not real. She certainly felt real, the aches of the car crash hours prior sinking into her joints and stiff movements, but when Reid's expression had softened and he'd paused only a second before holstering his gun and grabbing her into a hug that felt both protective and familiar, she hadn't resisted. He'd asked her if she was okay in a voice that was edged with worry but strong at the center –– the very place where the slightest bit of hope had lived all the past few months.

"I wasn't going to ruin my life, Emily."

On the couch in her apartment and abruptly dislodged from the past, Emily watched as Reid leaned forward and blinked rapidly.

She spoke the truth, "I wasn't lying, Reid. I know how it feels to want revenge, to want someone dead, and to want to be the person who pulls the trigger."

He nodded at the floor, like he knew, which Emily realized he had.

"That's why I was scared for you, Reid. I knew how desperate you felt."

Weeks later, after his reinstatement and its stipulation, after she had told the review board that she would trust him with her life and with the team's lives and that he should return to the BAU, she'd looked into Spencer's eyes and seen the resolve when he told her that he wanted to kill Scratch for what the man had done to _her_ , not to _him_ , his mother, or his life the past few months. Emily thought it would be understandable that Reid would want to murder the man who had thrown his life, all of their lives, into such turmoil, but his protection for her had nearly shattered her strength in the Naples precinct. After all this time, after all the things they'd witnesses and been through, after all the times they'd both almost disappeared, he still could make her both simultaneously ashamed and grateful for her life and for his presence in it.

"I know," he turned to face her again, eyes almost like they once were –– innocent and wide from his confession. "I could tell from your voice that you knew how I felt and that you were scared."

It was funny, Emily reasoned, that they both had used the word "scared." In all the years they'd worked together, she'd never really heard Reid admit that feeling so directly. Sure, she'd seen him scared, as he had seen her many times, but neither had as much as breathed the emotion openly perhaps because they both superstitiously believed that actually acknowledging fear would cause it to take over and spiral through their lives.

"Are you scared now?" She asked.

Against what her brain told her was a great choice, Emily instinctively placed a gentle hand on Reid's shoulder, pretending not to notice when he jumped and his shoulder blades crunched underneath his skin and her palm.

Reid felt his insides heave, the automatic surge of bile that bolted upward, the rapid thoughts ping-ponging inside his brain, and he took in the wavering sight of Emily's blue and white patterned through rug, the press of her fabric couch again his shaking body, her low and soothing voice. Despite her comfort and his rocketing, conflicting emotions, his heart was still pounding in time to the chaos unfolding in his mind. Memories, and moments were playing everything around him, as if he was the conductor of a symphony that must be practiced over and over in failed attempts to correct the discordant noise.

Finally, he whispered the truth, "I'm always scared now."

"That's okay, Spencer. It's okay to feel scared."

Reid caught Emily's eye when she spoke. He wanted to argue that it wasn't okay, had even parted his lips to do so, but the words were lost. In a second, his expression crumpled, and Reid fell toward Emily, sobbing, gasping for air so forcefully that Emily was sure he was hyperventilating. The force of Reid's breakdown pushed her body backward toward the arm of the couch, but Emily caught her balance, countering Reid's body with her arms, which she steadily wrapped around his shaking frame.

Reid hadn't expected to break, especially onto Emily, but he was sick of being so electrocuted by fear, terrified that every time he turned around he'd find himself back in prison, the whole thing just a dream and he'd wake to the consequences of Mexico. He was sick of the pull in his stomach when he thought about how close he'd been to ten years sober until Lindsey Vaughn had drugged him and made him believe he'd killed someone. He was exhausted from always looking over his shoulder, with pacing the floors each night, wanting to sleep but not wanting to confront the dreams where he realized he was the murderer as the viscous blood on the knife slowly slid onto his hands.

He didn't know what to do when other ghosts from his past came back in a blinding loop: Elle downing drinks from a hotel minibar; Gideon's cold and stiff body in the morgue; Owen Savage and his own pleading take-down under a blinding Texas sun; Morgan in the ambulance after his abduction, and Reid, for once, telling Morgan it would be okay; the weight of Blake's credentials in his hand; Rossi's first admonishing glance when Reid had quoted his book at the man during a moment alone at a crime scene; the stub of Emily's fingernails and his verbal recognition that she had given in to the anxious habit; Hotch's wavering eulogy for his murdered wife coupled with the barely visible outline of Foyet's face and Morgan's strong arms around Hotch in the unit chief's darkened home; the tormented look behind Morgan's eyes in a precinct in Chicago where, in no uncertain terms, Reid had finally put the pieces of Morgan's past into place; Garcia's voice over static phone lines as she recorded his tribute to his mother from an anthrax-infested lab; Garcia and surprise days earlier when he'd thrown a book in the BAU; Emily's grave and the mockingly bright sunshine the day of her funeral; the sense of awe for life that had burst inside him when he'd first held his newborn godson; Tara's concern for her brother when Scratch had taken him, and how Reid has recognized it was the same concern he'd worn many times for his mother; the warmth in the kitchen during Rossi's cooking lesson; the shock plastered on all their faces when Emily had appeared from death; the oblivious slide as dilaudid that took hold in the small shack; the pleading look in JJ's eyes when they'd stupidly separated at the Hankel Farm; Gideon telling him he wasn't responsible because Hankel was trying to pervert and play God; the darkened Georgia cemetery where he'd once dug his own grave while praying Hotch would arrive in time. But Hotch wasn't coming back for him or any of them, and Reid was both happy and sad by this knowledge, yet he was no longer a naïve man who believed he could escape his demons.

"I'm so scared," he managed to choke out between the gulps of air and the deluge of memories. "I've never been this scared before, Emily."

In response, Emily's pulled Reid closer while she ignored the wetness on her cheeks. Reid was right, as he usually was: this time was worse than before.

Emily wasn't sure how long Reid cried, but, in time, the sobs began to lessen until Reid began to still, his breaths began to even, and when Emily's arms and legs tingled with lack of use, she realized Reid was asleep. Desperate to let him rest, Emily channeled her inner contortionist until she managed to slip out from underneath his dead weight, replacing her body with a pillow and a warm throw blanket.

After a few leg lifts, blood flow tingled back to her extremities. Emily walked across the room, stopping only once to pet Sergio. In the kitchen, Emily tiptoed through making a large pot of coffee. When he would wake, whenever that was, Emily was sure Reid would want some even if it still felt weird to see him drink it black after all the years of watching him pour sugar packet after sugar packet into his mug.

 _Prison changes people,_ she reminded herself while fixing her own mug and heading back to her living room. _Prison has changed Reid,_ she admitted with a swell of nausea.

In a soft armchair, Emily felt her tense muscles relax even as the hot liquid burned painfully through ceramic and onto her palms. For a moment, Emily ignored the sensation before switching her hold to the looped handle, releasing the discomfort as easily as she could have switched on a light. Across the room, Reid slept and the only evidence of life was from the small snores that escaped through his parted lips.

Emily thought about what he'd told her earlier about the drinking and the meaningless one-night stand and she wondered if he should be reinstated in a few weeks. No doubt, he'd know what to tell the BAU's psychologist, but she knew that he was so low that he may, for once, tell the truth. Still, Emily knew it would be the team's job, her job, to keep a watchful eye on him to really ensure he was coping. Would she, like so many years prior, observe his defiant rebellion and call for help via a missed plane in Houston or hear his uncharacteristic outbursts when he'd, openly, for the first time in memory and years, admitted to his drug abuse in a another city's precinct? Emily knew she'd stop him before he reached either level of lost again, but she was afraid he may have already reached the breaking point long before any of them returned to work.

The younger agent had some time off, sure, but was it enough time? Did any of them really have enough time? Stephen certainly hadn't, yet the universe had balanced somehow because Hotch suddenly had all the time that had escaped him for years and years.

Running her free hand through the tangles in her hair, Emily thought about her second return to the BAU, which had been, thankfully, different than the first. She wasn't burned out, hiding the memories and flashbacks of Doyle from everyone but Hotch, who had calmly asked her to tell him when the day came when she found herself spiraling.

She'd kept her promise to the old unit chief, but she'd hated herself for it, so much so that she'd drank too much that night she had disclosed to him. Soon after landing, she'd hightailed it to some shady bar only to trip and bust her lip on a parking meter upon exiting hours later.

She'd called Hotch then, drunk and cold and bleeding on the side of the street, and he'd quickly found her, pulled her inside his warm car and then dark home, quietly and solidly allowing her to cry on his shoulder until she fell asleep on the couch, waking in the morning to a homemade breakfast, a smile and a warm hug from Jack, all with no mentioning of the night before even though she was sure she was in for a lecture focused solely on her poor coping skills.

Reid stirred on the couch, but didn't wake. Emily stared at his fluttering eyelashes, the curl of his fingers around the edge of the blanket, the stretch of his long legs that hung over the edge of a cushion. Sensing a warm body, Sergio had jumped onto the couch arm and cautiously found his way to a free spot by Reid's hip. Now, he was curled close, purring audibly. Emily hoped that Reid, even in his deep sleep, felt how much he was loved.

Her lip quivered, and she exhaled into the room beginning to light with the new day. Not bothering to wipe the tears off her cheeks, Emily turned to gaze out the window. As the DC skyline began to emerge from the night, she realized how worried Hotch must of felt that night she called him to retrieve her inebriated self from a sketchy dive bar. Years ago, her own trauma had made her leave even with Hotch's support, and Emily wasn't sure she wouldn't blame herself if Reid decided to leave. This part of being the team's leader was the hardest, and Emily wasn't expecting to feel sideswiped by feelings of responsibility for the young man she'd come to view closer than any family member over the long years they fought wars with blackness. In a rush, her own words came back to her:

" _No, no, no, Spence, please. I need someone I know is real right now, alright?"_

To be real, Emily realized, was to both be loved and to be lost, and to be unsure of both. To be real, was to admit when you were struggling, when you couldn't manage, when you were afraid that everything would stop its twirl around the sun, burst into fiery waves, and pull you into the black holes of your past.

In a few hours, Reid would wake, and Emily would cook pancakes, watching how a vestige of the old Reid saturated the stack in syrup, shoving the food into his malnourished body, hungry from the lack of sustenance and the release of such a heavy, complex weight. Emily would pretend not to notice when he slipped Sergio a piece of bacon, and she'd laugh to tears when Reid recounted his drunken, uncoordinated hookup even if the whole idea of his need to connect his body with another in the most basic way filled her with a sadness so deep she couldn't locate its origin.

A few hours after breakfast and copious cups of coffee, she'd eventually drive him to his apartment, wordlessly follow him inside and begin, without being asked, to clean, placing books on shelves and dirty dishes inside the dishwasher. She'd vacuum while Reid showered, even placing another load his laundry into the washer after she gave him a melatonin before telling him go rest in his bed with its newly clean sheets.

Perched on the edge of his bed, she'd watch him fight sleep, only to give in when, at last, his eyelids flapped to close. For a long time, she'd watch the small rise and fall of his chest, the miniscule blinks of long lashes, the angular cheekbones in the dim light.

Only then, would she realize to be real was to pray for penance with hopes that the new days would lead everyone to an absolution even though it had been many, many years since she'd believed in the power of faith. To be real, was to recite a mantra over and over, hoping and wishing that the world she built and the people she loved would come crashing inside, calling out, promising love and offering themselves as salvation. To be real, was to hold Reid in her arms and to promise he would okay, even when she knew he couldn't entirely return to the person he'd been before. To be real, was to let go of some of the past lightness, to accept some the present weight, and, still, to hold onto future hope, no matter how fleeting and obscured.

Emily turned away from the window, focusing on the sleeping man on her couch. In the morning's new light, she was almost certain Reid understood.

To be real, was to wait for a friend to wake and to face the new day together.


End file.
